


A Winning Smile

by alicat54c



Series: Pack Mentality [2]
Category: Bleach
Genre: Arrancar dont have much use for gender, F/F, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-20
Updated: 2019-06-20
Packaged: 2020-05-15 02:21:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,289
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19286137
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alicat54c/pseuds/alicat54c
Summary: “I am Harribel,” the former tetra said, since Kaien appeared to want to do redundant introductions.Kaien waved her still outstretched hand. “I like your, um.” She flushed, and the curtain of tentacles tightened to obscure her own body further.Something in Harribel’s chest sat up, like scenting blood in the water.





	A Winning Smile

**Author's Note:**

> AN: This is all I have of the story, but I’m posting it here anyway.

...

The king of Las Noches wanted a garden.

Of course, the orange haired being did not explicitly make that statement. However, between the logical plans for a bathhouse and the hints at moral boosting with communal places to relax, it was clear he was making excuses to create a garden.

Harribel wondered if the young man had his priorities properly ordered, what with his people preparing to go to war.

Never the less, she readily agreed to lend her aid to the effort, thinking it to be a diverting exercise in the fine control of water. The former tetra held more of an appreciation for training than her brethren, evidenced by how well her fraccion worked together.

So, that led to the shark like hollow releasing her resurrection form to flood rocky landscape of the bright inner courtyard of the palace. Half of her attention was occupied preventing the water draining through the miscellaneous doorways and corridors branching from the large room, allowing the rest of her mind to wander.

Idly, she wondered how Aizen had kept such a large space as brightly lit as what other hollows assured her was a sunny day. Perhaps Mugetsu had discovered that secret upon taking over the palace. She considered asking him whether such aesthetic pleasantries could be extended to her territory, but thought better of it. Most of her people commuted between the villages in the Spires and Las Noches anyway, so all would have ample opportunity to see the light. 

The water splashed and shuddered, snapping the shark’s attention to the disturbance. She blinked twice.

A willowy figure waded through the makeshift sea, bending the waters away from the arrancar’s control to redirect it to cut down into the sandstone.

“What are you doing,” the shark demanded.

The figure jumped, curtain of tentacles falling from its shoulders immediately moving to cover the scantily clad body, which presented as decidedly female. Blue eyes darted around, before falling on Harribel. The stranger flushed.

“The architect wants the bath house up here, so the water can flow out of the plumbing there and through the groves of trees.” She explained, tentacles wobbling in a self conscious shrug. “I’m Kaien,” she added, sticking out a hand.

Harribel glanced at the proffered appendage, wondering exactly what she was meant to do with it. The dark haired woman flushed, and quickly snatched her hand back.

“I am Harribel,” the former tetra said, since Kaien appeared to want to do redundant introductions.

Kaien waved her still outstretched hand. “I like your, um.” She flushed, and the curtain of tentacles tightened to obscure her own body further.

Something in Harribel’s chest sat up, like scenting blood in the water.

“Seriously, I think our outfits were created by some manga-ka trying to reel in teenage boys using scantily dressed women.” Kaien spluttered.

“Well, your form surly deserves flaunting.”

Kaien blushed, and her veil of whips wriggled in unconscious pleasure around her body. “Oh, but I’m clearly out shined when next to you.”

Harribel ran a hand over her smooth cheek, the tilt of her lips for once visible as a smile. “Yes, well I’m down a limb, while you’ve gained quite a few. I’m sure there’s much to envy in that.” She waved her sword arm for emphasis.

Kaien looked in danger of passing out from all the blood rushing to her face. “Right. Um. Well. I’m just going to…go.” 

Harribel nodded as she turned to go, another smile gracing her features as the distinct sound of a head being dunked in the newly created pond reached her ears.  
...

Green, that was the color. Like acid, or slime, only more gentle. Harribel contemplated the foliage. One of the false hollows had brought some bushes and trees for the garden. The trees in Hueco Mundo were of petrified white stone, and Harribel found herself trying to place the strange colors of these living trees.

 

 

“Stark feels better when he looks at the trees. It’s not something our minds can make up.”

Harribel’s head snapped to the side, where a tiny green haired girl looked whistfully at the saplings.

“Oh,” Harribel glanced back at the small grove with new understanding. 

“Kaien said you guys were going to put in a river? To make it less quiet until we can move in some birds and things?”

“Did she now?” Harribel, living in the desert, had no real experience with bodies of water not of her own making. Something inside her gut trembled in anticipation of creating some with her dark haired companion.  
...

The garden was finished; sweeping paths lined with flowering shrubs and willowy saplings, a bathhouse beside a steaming pond, which broke into pleasing streams across the former wasteland.

Harribel sensed the waters shift in a familiar way, pulling like the tide towards the only other hydrokinetic in Las Noches.

She turned the corner into a grove of trees, greeting already on her lips. She paused at the sight that greeted her. “Kaien?”

The figure, a man a head shorter than herself, with familiar dark hair and blue eyes, flinched and tried to hide his face. “Ah, no, nothing to see-“

“Kaien what are you doing?”

The man’s hands fell. “I didn’t want you to see me like this,” Kaien muttered, ducking his head.

Harribel furrowed her brow. “Did you believe I would think you weak when not in your resurrection form? Don’t worry, I still find you a capable companion.”

The man glanced up, mouth partly open. “No, I meant... see me as a-” He cut himself off scrutinizing her face. “Don’t I look different to you?”

The hollow ran her eyes over his frame sensually. “Well,” she rolled the word around her tongue like wine, “Now that you mention it, I do miss the tentacles.”

“N-no!” Kaien flushed darkly. “I mean- I’m a man!”

There was a pause as the woman tried to understand the importance of his statement. “...Yes? And...?”

The dark haired being floundered. “I mean- I thought you only liked me because, well, because you thought I was a woman? Like, a woman all the time, I mean.”

Harribel laughed, raising a hand to cover the serrated teeth over the bottom of her face. Kaien stood, his arms tucked stiffly to his sides, awkwardly awaiting his companion regaining the ability to speak.

“I like you because you are Kaien!” she chuckled at last. “What does your shape have to do with who you are?”

“It, well, it matters to a lot of people...” he trailed off lamely.

The hollow shook her head pityingly. “You still think to much like a shinigami.”

“It really doesn’t bother you?” Kaien asked, disbelief still tinging the corners of his demeanor.

She raised an eyebrow. “I was a giant shark before becoming an arrancar, and both of those forms were Harribel. You are Kaien, and no matter what form you take, I find you a pleasing companion.”

Tears pricked the former-death god’s eyes. He reached up with a sleeve to rub them away, but Harribel caught his cheek in her palm, stopping his movement. She stared down into his watery blues, her eyebrows drawn in concern.

“This weighed heavily on your mind, didn’t it.”

“Yeah,” his voice cracked. This time the tears did fall. 

The blonde leaned forwards resting her forehead against his. “I’m sorry I cannot kiss away your tears in this form.”

Kaien chuckled wetly. “That’s all right, I’ll kiss enough for both of us.”

The couple bent intimately close, air thick with implications, when-

Red lights flared in the corridor, and a blaring alarm sounded through the walls.

“Artificial garganta detected,” an impersonal voice stated. 

Blue eyes met green, darkening in preparatory excitement.

The shinigami were here.

...


End file.
